statism watch

Simply more of what we’ve come to expect from Obama and his predecessors.

Flashback: Latest Round of Closed-Door ACTA Copyright Negotiations Wrap Up | Digital rights groups sue for access to secret ACTA treaty | Transparency needed on ACTA

Techdirt.com
March 13, 2009

Plenty of folks are quite concerned about the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) negotiations are being negotiated in secret. This is a treaty that (from the documents that have leaked so far) is quite troubling. It likely will effectively require various countries, including the US, to update copyright laws in a draconian manner. Furthermore, the negotiators have met with entertainment industry representatives multiple times, and there are indications that those representatives have contributed language and ideas to the treaty. But, the public? The folks actually impacted by all of this? We’ve been kept in the dark, despite repeated requests for more information. So far, the response from the government had been “sorry, we always negotiate these things in secret, so we’ll keep doing so.” At one point, even the ACTA negotiators held a closed-door meeting and then released a press release saying they discussed being more transparent, but haven’t actually followed through.

(more…)

Wow. This coming from a guy that studied Hayek in depth with Tom Flanagan, another member of the ‘conservative’ braintrust that has embraced intellectual nihilism. Well, by way of flipping the bird right back, here’s a salvo of truth at the PM – someone that has betrayed the principles they held in their youth and sold out to international corporativist interests. It’s very sad. Pathetic, really. He’s now an authoritarian that will stop at nothing to hold power (proroguing parliament, threatening the opposition’s funding), and it’s doubly tragic that many of his supporters know it. So here we are now, on the Road to Serfdom. Ironic.

Flashback: Deficits ‘essential,’ Harper says | Harper’s own lawyer decides to bail on Cadman scandal | Cadman ‘bribe tape’ not altered as Harper claimed, expert finds | Harper wins delay of hearing on Cadman tape | Comedian begins asking Harper question, cuffed by RCMP | Green Party leader calls out Harper, Layton for debate boycott threats | PM’s tactic `authoritarian’ | Tory ‘Guilty before proven innocent’ law to make debut in court | Information lockdown: How Harper Controls the Spin | Parliament losing power, author says | PM’s aide fuelled uproar | Tape suggests PM knew of alleged Cadman offer | ‘What is it they’re trying to hide?’ NDP asks for military export data | Harper to create government-run media centre: report | Harper pledges to boost military presence in cities | Harper, Bush Share Roots in Controversial Philosophy | Steven Harper and the Bilderbergers Secret Meeting

Mike Brock, WesternStandard.ca
March 13, 2009

Standing in a room of conservative activists sipping a beer, there is a sudden silence and moment of confusion as a speaker at the microphone inexplicably stops speaking mid-sentence.

All the people at the front of the room have diverted their gaze to the entrance to the room. Suddenly, the prime minister of the country comes blazing through the door with his RCMP security detail.

(more…)

Flashback: Halifax thinks again about subjecting applicants to lie-detector tests | ‘Pre-crime’ detector shows promise | India’s use of brain scans in courts dismays critics

Ian Sample, The Guardian
March 13, 2009

In Ridley Scott’s 1982 sci-fi classic, Bladerunner, the police have a problem. The wayward androids they are pursuing behave so much like humans, they have a tough time telling them apart.

They turn to the Voight-Kampff test, a futuristic version of the age-old polygraph, to help them out. During the test, subjects are grilled with a list of questions, while their physiology is monitored. In particular, the test looks for abnormal eye responses that might indicate the subject isn’t human.

The test is far from perfect, and no doubt there will be teething troubles that beset the development of a similar test the US department of homeland security is looking for help in making.

(more…)

What do we want in Canada – police or secret police? It’s through the expansion of techniques such as this that the ranks of the STASI swell until they devour a culture.

Peter Edwards, The Toronto Star
March 13, 2009

Her car has broken down and she is all alone. Young, attractive and in distress, she looks fetchingly at a young man leaving work and asks if he would be so good as to help.

He obliges.

Before they part, she hands him her phone number, then smiles with the unspoken promise of future romance.

He cannot believe his good fortune. But in reality, the woman is an undercover RCMP officer, and soon he will be in a prison cell.

(more…)

This is actually all over the web. Of course, there’s no danger of this actually being used domestically… none at all… right? No, we need to do something to protect ourselves from the rise of an oppressive, high tech police state.

Flashback: Remote-controlled planes could spy on British homes | Predator drones patrolling border irk Manitoba MLA | Hoverdrone to be deployed to Iraq

Julian E. Barnes, LA Times
March 13, 2009

The giant dirigible would use radar to closely and constantly monitor activity on the ground from 65,000 feet.

Reporting from Washington — The Pentagon said Thursday that it intends to spend $400 million to develop a giant dirigible that will float 65,000 feet above the Earth for 10 years, providing unblinking and intricate radar surveillance of the vehicles, planes and even people below.

“It is absolutely revolutionary,” Werner J.A. Dahm, chief scientist for the Air Force, said of the proposed unmanned airship — describing it as a cross between a satellite and a spy plane.

The 450-foot-long craft would give the U.S. military a better understanding of an adversary’s movements, habits and tactics, officials said. And the ability to constantly monitor small movements in a wide area — the Afghanistan- Pakistan border, for example — would dramatically improve military intelligence.

(more…)